Baron of Blackwood

by Tamara Leigh

  He had said he liked his women bold, but if the king decided against her brother, this could prove too bold, his premature joining with the dispossessed man’s sister of possible detriment to the De Arells—though not, he believed, to the extent he risked forfeiture of Blackwood. What he risked was Godsmere and Emberly.

  Griffin was fairly certain the king would not divest Boursier or Verdun of their lands, but what he had not told Quintin on the night past, liking too well her gratitude for the aid given her brother, was what he would do if the baronies were forfeited.

  Since one or both would be awarded to a vassal who held favor with the king, the De Arells being the one family that had not defied the decree stood a good chance of being granted their petition to lord those lands. As Griffin had suggested the day Quintin had drawn a dagger on him, marriage to her—for the sake of the Foucault name, which would likely appeal to Edward—could see the great barony of Kilbourne stitched back together under the De Arells.

  Or not.

  If he wed her without awaiting the determination about her brother’s marriage, he could also be seen as defying the decree and, thus, the baronies would be awarded to another. However, if he did not wed her before the determination and still the king gifted the baronies elsewhere, so might Quintin be.

  So wed her now to ensure he gained the woman he wanted? Or wait on the possibility of a barony three times the size of Blackwood, as it should have been when Archard Boursier and Rand Verdun pledged to support Ulric’s bid to become the Baron of Kilbourne those many years ago?

  Grunting low, Griffin retrieved the knife and considered the meat at its tip. Then he pulled it off and extended it.

  Quintin blinked. “This is your answer?”

  Regretting the strain in her voice that told she might draw back from the progress they had made toward each other, he said, “As you have given it some thought, so must I.”

  She opened her clenched hands in her lap, and he thought she would go from the hall, but she took the meat. “I thank you. If you would cut more, ’twill suffice to place it on the platter’s edge.”

  She did draw back, but not as far as feared. Satisfied as much as was possible, he inclined his head.

  However, when darkness fell over the barony of Blackwood and the castle folk once more gathered for a light supper, she sent a request for a tray to be delivered to her chamber. And Griffin allowed it.

  Lights. So terribly beautiful they entranced, tempting her to reach…touch…run fingers through them. But she knew better. They were in her head.

  “Dear Lord, let it go no further,” she whispered. “This. Only this.” Not the loss of sight, temporary though it was. Not the prickling along arms and legs that might turn numb. Not the faintness that could steal her consciousness whether she was on her feet or off them.

  Still, to all these sufferings she would consent were she spared that which sometimes followed and could last hours, even days—an intense, persistent throb in her head, nausea, vomiting, and the cruelty of light that she imagined as viciously pierced her eyes as had the blade that pierced Bayard’s eye.

  Blessedly, the Lord most often answered as she pleaded, but once and sometimes twice a year, He did not.

  The prickling began, moving up her fingers to her shoulders, then down her center to her toes. A whimper slipped from her, and she startled when it was answered by a whine from beyond the chamber—Arturo, that vile beast who had followed her abovestairs after the nooning meal.

  She had feared he would try to enter her chamber, but when she had paused at the door, he had continued past her and stretched out at the base of the stairs to Ulric de Arell’s apartment. By command of Griffin? Or merely a good vantage to watch her comings and goings without threat of being trod upon?

  He whined more loudly, as if he put his mouth to the space between door and floor.

  “Go away!” Quintin called and groaned over the slurred words and the sensation of the bed turning beneath her.

  More whining, followed by scratching and growling.

  “Accursed dog!” Lest his din attracted other unwelcome visitors, she clambered off the bed and bumped into the bedside table, causing the tray there to clatter. She tried to focus on the supper viands she had requested, since it was best to bide abovestairs as she did at Adderstone when the lights appeared, but the foodstuffs remained a blur.

  It mattered not. She would not partake until fairly certain this thing did not progress to a painful head and nausea.

  When a thud sounded against the door as if Arturo leapt at it, Quintin lurched across the chamber. There were fewer lights now, though only because blind spots vied for attention.

  Her seeking hand found the door, and she opened it just enough to show she was not in need of protection. “I am well. Now go—”

  The dog thrust inside, but she knew it only from the feel of him knocking against her legs. Holding tight to the door, she glimpsed him trotting around the bed, nose to the floor.

  “Arturo, go!” She opened the door wider and stumbled as more blind spots usurped the lights. Fearing the loss of consciousness, she closed the door, held her hands out before her for guidance and balance, and gave thanks when her knees hit the bed.

  She prostrated herself, but though she did not lose consciousness, she thought she hallucinated when a tongue ran up the hand of her arm hanging over the mattress.

  “You are supposed to hate me,” she mumbled and felt a wet nose bump the back of her hand. Then the ticklish hairs upon what might be the wolfhound’s head brushed her fingertips. “Oh, let us hope that neither does the king bite with the teeth he bares.”

  She slept some, and upon awakening, tested the weight of her head and thanked the Lord she suffered no more than the ghost of an ache. When next she awakened, it was the same, and she allowed herself to believe this menses would prove but the usual inconvenience.

  “You are awake?”

  She flipped onto her back, and by the torchlight shining through the doorway saw Griffin leaned over her. She nearly demanded his purpose, but it was obvious, her chill limbs covered by the fur he had given her that first night. And strangely, his consideration made her long to cry.

  He straightened. “When I saw Arturo was not outside your door, I hoped I would find him in your chamber.” He laid a hand to the neck of the wolfhound at his side.

  Quintin pulled the fur higher, tucked her chin into it. “Unfortunately, he insisted,” she said, then asked, “Sir Victor?”

  “Abed for the night.” He nodded at the door he had left open. “But if he arises, he can be assured naught untoward goes here.”

  Still her brother’s knight would not like finding the Baron of Blackwood at her bedside.

  “I am sorry you are so distressed you could not bring yourself to join me at table this eve,” Griffin said, “nor partake of the meal delivered you.”

  It had occurred to her he would believe her absence from the hall was due to his noncommittal response to her proposal, but though days past it would have been true—that she would have avoided being near him—she did not want the man who had covered her to believe that.

  “I am distressed, but ’tis not what held me to my chamber and ruined my appetite.”

  As Arturo groaned and set his chin on the mattress alongside Quintin’s thigh, Griffin prompted, “Then?”

  Twinged by discomfort, she told herself it was silly for a woman to feel such, and more so for a man who had once been wed. Still, there was no cause to be blunt. She pushed up onto her elbows. “Methinks I shall soon require cloths.”

  “For?”

  Perhaps somewhat blunt. “The curse of Eve.”

  Silence, then, “Ah. My departed wife called it the blessing of Eve.”

  “The blessing?”

  “Her mother died birthing her sister. Being just as slight of figure, Johanna counted it a blessing each time her menses arrived. Two years into our marriage, it did not.” His face was too shadowed for Quintin to glimpse
emotions there, but she felt sorrow in the silence—and a tightness in her chest for what he had yet to tell.

  “Rhys’s birth was difficult, but Johanna survived. For a year.”

  As Quintin knew, tale having been carried to Castle Adderstone that his wife had rarely risen from bed following their son’s birth. “I am sorry.”

  “As am I.” He curved a hand around her jaw. “But I shall wed again and Rhys will have more siblings.”

  Her heart spasmed.

  “I must needs think more on your proposal, Quintin, but know I do wish you to be my wife and bear my sons and daughters.”

  Emotions taking a messy turn, she nearly blurted that did they wed, she might herself count the arrival of her menses a blessing rather than a curse, but of greater fear than having to explain herself was the possibility he would reject her proposal outright if he knew the reason her fist once more pressed itself to her abdomen.

  She lowered her head to the pillow. “Then I await your decision, my lord. Good eve.”

  After some moments, he said, “Good eve, my lady,” and took Arturo with him and closed the door.

  He has his heir, she told her conscience, and if the king permits Bayard to remain Baron of Godsmere, Griffin will be bound to me no matter what I cannot give him.

  She drew the fist up her chest to where her heart beat, squeezed her lids closed. “The blessing of Eve,” she whispered. Never would she count it that, for she did wish children at her breast.

  And with God, it was possible, was it not?

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  “Oh, have mercy!”

  Quintin dragged her gaze from the skirmish that filled the air with grunts, shouts, and curses to the young woman who stood at her side near the stables in the outer bailey. “Mercy?”

  Lady Thomasin tossed her eyebrows high. “They make a performance of this—for you.”

  Quintin looked back at the fenced training yard where knights and men-at-arms fought not with swords, pikes, and maces but with missiles formed from last eve’s snowfall. The damp earth over which they moved was a muddy mess, most of its snow sacrificed to hands that shaped it into balls so hard and compact that, upon striking bare faces and hands, their glittering white explosions were sometimes flecked with blood.

  “Men!” Lady Thomasin grumbled. “As soon as Sir Bertrand’s snowball struck Sir Leeland between the eyes, he looked to you. Surely you know why.”

  Quintin did. Her attention was often sought at Adderstone, but here it was more amusing than annoying. Griffin’s men remained openly distrustful of her though she had resided in the keep three days, and when her menses did not overly bother her, took meal in the hall and strove to give them no further cause to think ill of her.

  Recalling their narrow-eyed stares, indignation pricked her, and she nearly laughed at herself. No matter how appealing they found her face and figure, they had good cause to be wary. Three days was naught compared to the twenty-five-year feud that had plagued not only the De Arells, Boursiers, and Verduns but their retainers. Too, though Griffin mostly showed her the regard due one thought to be the future Lady of Blackwood, still he did not allow her to cut her own meat—her public humiliation of him yet too fresh. But now that the worst of her menses was past, she would make a better effort to gain acceptance at Castle Mathe. Of course, she would have more cause to do so if Griffin agreed to her proposal.

  “You know why, do you not?” Lady Thomasin prompted.

  As Quintin tried to place herself back in their conversation, the young woman grunted. “Silly me. None need tell you the reason. ’Tis not as if only now, having caught my father’s eye, you have transformed into what you were not before.”

  Quintin hurt for her. Though Thomasin’s figure was pleasingly different from a man’s—indeed, better proportioned than Quintin’s—men who required gold, gemstones, and silk to be impressed would likely think themselves generous to name her pretty.

  Quintin glanced at Sir Victor who stood behind and to the left, and seeing his attention was on those in the training yard, touched Thomasin’s arm. “You are mistaken if you think I am the only lady who catches the regard of these men.”

  She scoffed. “They do not look at me as they do you. I am, if not overlooked, an annoyance.”

  Embellishment being in order, Quintin said, “I have seen many an admiring eye slant your way.”

  Hope flickered on her face, flickered out. “You are being kind.”

  “Am I?” She gasped. “Hold! Do not look at Sir Otto!”

  Obediently, the young woman fixed her gaze on the battling men inside the training yard. “Aye?”

  Quintin leaned near her, and the knight who had yet to participate in the hurling of snowballs frowned from her to Lady Thomasin. “As I have seen him do before, he looks kindly upon you.”

  “Kindly?”

  Moving her gaze back to the young woman, Quintin paused on Arturo, who was ever near in Griffin’s absence. When last she had looked, the wolfhound had watched from a distance of twenty feet, but he had moved nearer now that villagers entered the castle through a door in the portcullis.

  “Aye,” Quintin said. “Certes, ’tis not with indifference Sir Otto steals glimpses of you.” It was true, though very possible he was more curious as to what secrets passed between the ladies.

  A blush further darkened Thomasin’s chill-reddened cheeks. “Be he not most handsome?” she slipped into her commoner’s tongue.

  Tucking her chin into her mantle’s fur-lined collar, Quintin said, “And kind. But, alas, if the king accepts my brother’s marriage to Lady Elianor, Sir Otto will have to admire you from afar as the handsome Magnus Verdun claims your hand and your heart.”

  “I shall look now.” A moment later, Thomasin muttered, “If he did admire me, he has determined you are more worthy.”

  “Men!” Quintin scorned as the younger woman had done. But in the next instant, one who was increasingly difficult to scorn drew alongside her, accompanied by his son.

  She tensed. She knew Griffin’s reputation as a man of war, and even Bayard, the worthiest of rivals, owned that the Baron of Blackwood was formidable. Thus, he would be displeased to find his men playing at the games of children.

  But when she glanced at him, it seemed only with interest he surveyed the scene, then with teasing he said, “We men are much maligned, it sounds.”

  Thomasin laughed. “Not you, Father. Lady Quintin but remarks on Sir Otto’s inconstancy.”

  “What has he to be inconstant about?”

  “I complained that men do not look upon me with admiration as they do her, and considerate as she is, she made much ado that Sir Otto was admiring me. But when I peeked, his eyes were all for her.” She sighed. “Inconstant.”

  Amid her inner groaning, Quintin followed Griffin’s gaze to the knight. But where Sir Otto had been, he no longer stood.

  Rhys stepped in front of his father. “Are we not going?” he asked with less petulance than when Griffin had invited Quintin to join their ride to the wood.

  His father looked to the stables where ten horses were tethered, before them a horse-drawn wagon upon which perched four servants, who would make quick work of amassing the greenery needed to decorate the hall for the Christmas celebration four days hence.

  “All looks to be in readiness,” Griffin said. “Come.”

  As Rhys, Quintin, Thomasin, and Sir Victor followed, he ordered those yet engaged in throwing snowballs to return to their posts, called the names of the knights and men-at-arms who would accompany the party to the wood, and shouted for the portcullis to be raised.

  When he took hold of his destrier’s bridle and motioned Quintin forward, she faltered at the realization their armed escort numbered not five but six. With a glance at Thomasin and Rhys, who mounted their own horses, she said, “Just as I am not allowed to cut my own meat, neither may I guide my own mount?”

  “’Tis but a courtesy,” he said low and set his hands on her waist to lift her into
the saddle.

  She curled her fingers atop his, and too much liking how broad and powerful they felt beneath her smaller ones, was grateful her gloves were between them. “’Tis an intimacy I am loath to accept from one who has yet to confirm our union is a given.” She raised her eyebrows. “Is it?”

  He lowered his face so near hers, the cloud of his breath enveloped their faces. “I am near to deciding.”

  She struggled over the temptation to walk away, but beyond the deterrent of appearing childish, she was stayed by the longing to ride. Then there was her baser side that wanted his arms around her after what seemed weeks since last they had been so near. Hoping he also wished it, she eased her hands and lightly drew her fingers to his wrists. “Decide soon, Griffin.”

  His nostrils flared. “Mayhap we should ride separate.”

  “Mayhap you should decide.”

  With a chuckle, he lifted her onto his saddle. Then he swung up behind and slid an arm around her waist.

  She reached back and pulled the edges of his mantle forward and over her shoulders. After all, what was one more intimacy?

  “Do you work your wiles on me, my lady?”

  His voice at her ear made her shiver. “I could say ’tis only a courtesy”—as he had with regard to sharing his saddle—“but aye, I work my wiles on you.”

  “Ah, Quintin,” he murmured, “I do want you in my bed.”

  She sank back against him, laid an arm atop his around her waist, and slid her fingers into the grooves of his. “All the more reason to decide soon.”

  “Quintin Boursier,” Otto murmured where he sat astride his mount, one of the handful set to watch over those collecting pine boughs, holly, mistletoe, and other branches and clippings with which to bring the sights and scents of the black wood inside.